I am very pleased that my review of this excellent series appears in The New Social Worker. Its societal implications are profound.

Read the full review on socialworker.com

by SaraKay Smullens, MSW, LCSW, DCSW, CGP, CFLE, BCD

     However full your schedule, find time for The Pitt, nominated for 13 Emmys in major categories. You will be rewarded by a riveting 15-episode Max series, each episode documenting an hour in the 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. shift of Michael Robinavitch, MD, a.k.a. Dr. Robbie, played by Noah Wyle. In real life, Wyle’s mother was an OR nurse who took home a brain retractor to use as a butter knife, as well as gauze and tubing for her kids to play with. Wyle continued to cut his medical teeth on ER, the highly acclaimed Chicago-based medical drama, winner of 23 Emmys, which ran from 1994 to 2009, in which he played medical student John Carter.

     Robbie is the leading force behind the effectiveness of emergency med physicians, residents, nurses, ambulance drivers, hospital administrators, and one highly adept social worker. This team sees, faces, and treats everything you can imagine, including but not limited to patients presenting with heart attacks, addiction, measles, problem pregnancies, a fentanyl overdose, and mass shootings. All of this is amidst lack of funding for an acclaimed, financially strapped teaching hospital, lacking staff and space, facing patient dissatisfaction as well as targeted violence against them.

     “The Pitt” is shorthand for Pittsburgh Medical Trauma Hospital. It is also how employees reference the ER. But, to me, this title also holds far deeper meaning. The Pitt is symbolic of societal pitfalls, such as the breakdown of our crucial public health system, and the subsequent melding of both public and professional burnout, which—if not addressed—causes both withdrawal and dangerous acting out, each adaptation destructive to our vulnerable democracy. It begs the question: How can our country be the only existing democracy without universal health care? This leads to further examination: Can seeing, experiencing overload and suffering in a stunning series promote societal changes necessary to protect our collective future?

At this tragic time in the Middle East, where, like previous leaders, Hamas has no concern what-so-ever about the well being of the Palestinians -- how the millions invested in pervasive, underground tunnels could have benefited them!  -- and when Israel, like the US, has a leader devoid of any semblance of character, I was pleased that The Washington Post printed my letter about suffering, traumatized children.

To the editor:

Regarding the Aug. 1 Style article “How Ms. Rachel built her neighborhood”:

Undoubtedly, Rachel Griffin Accurso, better known as Ms. Rachel, is a kind, sensitive talent who well deserves the success of her appealing videos for children. Still, I wish she featured both a Palestinian child and an Israeli child who was taken hostage by Hamas. Accurso says she cares for all children. However, in only featuring a Palestinian child, she seemingly picked a side.

Like Accurso, I adored the comforting messages depicted by “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.” During a horrific divorce process, my little girls, who were 4 and 7, watched the show with rapt attention, and I joined them, never wanting it to conclude. When it inevitably did, I would assure my daughters that Mister Rogers would visit us the next day. (On Fridays, I would show them a calendar and point to Monday.) However, Rogers’s decision to invite a man of color to join the talent of his show is in no way analogous to Accurso’s decision to platform only one side of the horrifying Israel-Gaza war.

SaraKay Smullens
Philadelphia

Published in The Washington Post August 7, 2025

You may be interested in my review of the documentary, “Won’t You Be My Neighbor”. https://www.socialworker.com/feature-articles/reviews-commentary/wont-you-be-my-neighbor-mister-rogers-return-visit-fills-urgent-void/

The following letter was sent to the New York Times on July 24, 2025.

To the editor:

Your recent article by Jennifer Szalai (July 24, C4) referencing books from the right and left noting dangers of empathy have it backwards. Each ignores the important distinctions of researcher Karen Gerdes, emeritus professor at Arizona State University, which are built upon in my most recent book, “Burnout and Self-Care in Social Work: A Guide for Students and those in Mental Health and Related Professions” (ed 2, NASW Press, 2021),

To bottom line: Sympathy, first noted in the 16th century, offers a welcome break from pity, which emerged in the 13th century, originally offering a positive connotation of feeling sorrow for another’s suffering, but today recognized as condescending. Sympathy is derived from the Greek pre-fix syn, meaning “together” and the word “pathos,” meaning feelings. To sympathize is to experience a heightened awareness of another’s suffering, taking on another’s pain as your own, a dangerous state, leading to burnout. 

In contrast to pity and sympathy, the concept of empathy, only 100 years old, reflects one’s ability to develop boundaries — to separate our lives and challenges from others, and in this way, hear, think, and plan with both caring and clarity... 

Empathy helps to prevent burnout, as well as poor judgement. To offer remembered political examples: Sympathy, caring without boundaries, led to poor screening for criminality of those who entered our country from Cuba, a trend that continued, and was blown out of proportion, contributing to the election of our 47th president.

Sincerely,
SaraKay Smullens

Sent to the New York Times, July 24, 2025